


Hiraeth

by magnuspr1m3



Series: Marvel Oneshots [8]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Amnesiac Bucky Barnes, Angst and Tragedy, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Character Death, F/M, Memory Loss, Natasha Romanov Feels, Natasha Romanov Is Not A Robot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-22
Updated: 2018-07-22
Packaged: 2019-06-14 16:08:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15392445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magnuspr1m3/pseuds/magnuspr1m3
Summary: He knew three things for sure after waking up:1. He played the cello.2. She loved him.3.  It had not been an accident.It feels like he is in a time loop; he kept waking up back in that hospital, always with the same excuse. You were in an accident. But something was not right. He was missing something. He just did not know what.





	Hiraeth

**Author's Note:**

> I have so many other longer fics to get edited and posted, but I had to get this one out there. I generally do not ship Bucky and Nat, but this one just kinda... worked its way out. Also, this one is written in what some of you may see as an odd style, and you may want to read carefully to know when people are talking.

The song was always the same. A deep, longing whine in a minor key as he forced the bow along. The fingers of his left hand rocked and danced along the strings, but something was wrong. Like every time before, something was _wrong_. The notes were perfect, his tempo correct, but he was wrong. He was wrong. And there was no way that he knew of to fix that.

                So he just played it again.

 

When he woke up the first time, they said he had been in an accident. He believed them, of course. Why would he not? They then asked him a series of questions he could not answer. It became apparent quickly how severe his accident was. His brain was not transferring data properly between his short and long-term memory. A side effect of his accident, supposedly. And he believed them.

                He believed them when they brought in a young woman, her hair a red so bright it looked like flames flowing down her neck and shoulders. A friend of his, they said. Your family can’t make it, they said. He just nodded, mesmerized by her hair. She sat stiffly by him, her eyes never leaving his face. The nurses and doctors left, and she was silent for a long time. They studied each other. He relearned her features, and she drank his in. He did not envy her the feeling of losing someone forever; he got the easy part in all of this, really.

                When she finally did speak, she said: you were in an accident.

                He did _not_ believe her.

 

His family never did come see him. There were no phone calls. No one said a word to him outside of the hospital staff and her. He received a few cards, some flowers, and balloons. Friends, she told him, and students. He did not read what anyone wrote to him, though. Could not find it in himself to do that. Everyone insisted that it could help with his memory, but he refused. They would not help. It was not some fairy tale. This was his life. He would not just magically remember. The accident was no accident. Were it an accident, he would be allowed to explore the hospital. There would not be someone checking on him every fifteen minutes if he were not in danger. Someone had meant for him to forget, or worse.

                He thought it may have been him.

 

You teach cello. And this he accepted completely as truth. It felt right. She said it and something in his brain just clicked. Yes. He played and taught cello. This was fact. So it made perfect sense to him that he would ask to see a cello one day.

                They told him no.

                He had no idea why they rejected his request. It seemed simple enough to him. He taught cello. He must own one. He just wanted them to bring him the cello he owned. He wanted to play it, even if he did so abhorrently at first. Perhaps his muscles remembered what his brain could not. He begged her to bring him his cello. Begged the nurses to tell the doctors that he needed it.

                They all said no.

 

He counted twelve days before they allowed him out of his room. Twelve days from his first moment of true coherence after this supposed accident, and an innumerable amount prior. He had been stunned when one of the nurses came into his room with a wheelchair and offered to help him into it.

                Where are we going?

                Outside. They want you to go out to the courtyard for a bit, to get some fresh air.

                He almost complained about the wheelchair, saying that he could walk with a little help and was not an invalid. It would not change anything, though. So he did not say another word as the nurse guided him into the chair, through a blanket over his legs for warmth. It must have been later in the year, then. Or early. The chill would be nice compared to the sterile warmth of his room.

                They passed by many other rooms on their way to the courtyard, all windowless like his own. The halls were lined with fluorescent lights, hurting his eyes almost. Brighter than the sun, he thought, although it had been so long since he had seen the sun that he could not know for sure. Which caused his heart to give an excited flutter in his chest, because _he was about to see the sun again_.

 

I heard they took you outside yesterday. He gave the red head a curious look at the tone of her voice, head tilting ever so slightly to the side. He nodded, expecting her to continue. Or, he hoped she would continue. It was rare when she actually spoke to him more than a few sentences here or there. If a nurse, doctor, or one of his psychiatrists was around, she spoke plenty. She seemed cheery and happy to be around him in those moments. But when it was just them? She quite obviously did not want to be there.

                The room remained silent after his nod for a few moments before he gave an annoyed sigh and spoke. It was a bit chilly, but I enjoyed going out. My eyes hurt a bit; artificial light and the sun are two _very_ different things. A chuckle escaped him, just barely audible under his breath and startled them both briefly. Their eyes widened, and they looked at each other. He knew why the chuckle startled him. The joke, if you could call it that, was not that funny. It was more of a stupid, sarcastic remark. And his own, at that. He felt rather embarrassed to have laughed at it.

                Her shock, though? He had no clue what might cause that. Before he could ask, she was gone.

 

She did not come back. His doctors said that she was busy with work, and not able to make it. Their tone was dismissive enough, though, that he questioned it. Never aloud, or to anyone with actual answers. Those who had answers also had power to make his life much worse than it was. And he did not want to risk that. Not when they were letting him out on his own to walk around. There was even talk of bringing him his cello. He had to be a perfect patient to ensure that he could have it, get over this feeling. He needed to be perfect to get his cello and escape here like the red head did. Perhaps when he escaped he would see her again.

 

You can leave tomorrow, if you check out with the psychiatrists. A nurse told him with a pleasant grin. She was one of his usual nurses, who had been helping him since the beginning. He liked her. She was nice, and much friendlier than the other nurses he usually saw. She actually treated him like a person all of the time and checked in on him because she wanted to. (Or she claimed she did.)

 

When he woke up the second time, his head hurt and body ached. You were in an accident, they explained. And he knew the truth. So he said that, before they asked all their nonsense questions. He opened his mouth and said, No I wasn’t. He had wanted to die. He had swallowed all of those pills on purpose. The doctor frowned and shook his head, nodding to a nurse off to the side.

                Again, he said. Again.

                He learned quickly to play along after the third time he heard it. Again. _Again_. One word, with no natural negative connotation except for there. The moment he heard it from those doctors, he braced for the worse. A wipe is what they called it. They were planning to wipe that negative memory from his mind; to “free” him from it. Their method for trying was excruciating to say the least.

                The chair was the worst part. It held him in place, arms strapped to the sides, along with his legs. One strap went just loosely enough around his neck to keep from choking him, a little bit of padding on it to try and prevent chaffing. Then there was the needle, right along the back of the neck that slipped in as they adjusted the neck strap. The first two times he fought them with all his might, trying to escape it, to escape them and this crazy hospital he had found himself in. That made it hurt even more as it jabbed directly into his spinal column. The injection won’t take long, they would say. You will fall right to sleep in a moment. When you wake up, it will all be over.

                It never was. It would never end, he realized. He could only play along for so long. He just had to get out and get away from there. To escape this crazy place and find a place for himself to just drift away.

 

She would come visit every time. It was always somewhat awkward. Like she did not want to be there. She kept her distance, watching him wearily. He worried that perhaps she thought he was going to lash out at her like he did himself. That he would take his desperation and self-hatred out on her. Not that he could. Aside from the one female nurse, she was the only person who actually showed concern. She cared. He did not really remember why, but she cared for him.

                And he imagined that once upon a time he cared for her, too.

 

Each time they released him, the first thing he would do was go and get his cello. He would pull it gently from its case and take the time to meticulously clean the body with lemon oil. Next, he would rosin the bow, careful of the delicate horse hair on it. He would sit in the seat by the window of his lonely apartment, cello between his knees. His gazed danced from person to person walking up and down the street as he tuned the strings. Then, he would pull in a deep breath, place the bow on the d string, and start to play.

                The notes were perfect, without a doubt. His rhythm was steady and his vibrato without err. Everything about it was right, but him. He was what was wrong with it. And there was only one way he could think to fix that in his sudden wash of hopelessness. It was definitely not the most rational idea he had probably ever had, but it felt like the only way.

                He had to die. In their attempts to fix whatever had been wrong with him before, they had broken him further. They had ruined him for his music. They had ruined him, and now he needed to die to fix it.

 

They labeled him a difficult case the third time he remembered waking up after trying to kill himself. He only knew this because he heard one of the nurses muttering to a doctor about the changes to his chart. He was not showing any signs of improvement apparently. They had never seen someone so resistant. She did not know what else to do.

                The doctor had quieted her down when he caught his eye, telling her to simply go and get his lunch and medicine. He continued to talk to him like nothing was wrong, asking him about his day and how he was feeling. He wanted to say confused, and perhaps scared. He had no clue what was going on. It was starting to feel like he was stuck in a loop at that point. He could not escape it. Every time he tried to end it, to stop the madness, he wound up back there. Over and over and over and over again, he woke up to the same forced smiles and feigned concern, asking if he remembered how he got there. When he lied and said no, they would tell him he was in an accident. He was lucky to be alive. He did not feel quite so lucky.

 

The one person who made it bearable, funnily enough, was the redhead. After a few times, she stopped avoiding him so much. He did not know what caused the sudden change, but she started to open up to him. She sat beside his bed, reading all of the cards and letters he had previously neglected. She told him of her work at the university that he taught at, of how his students would come to her complaining about the substitute and asking her to hurry his recovery. She told him of dates they had apparently gone on in the past, of dates she had imagined for their future. She spoke of a nice cottage in the mountains, secluded and simple. They had gone occasionally when they were younger. It was their place.

                It pained him to not find reason enough in that not to try and end it again and again.

 

It took twenty-three tries. _Twenty-three_. Twenty-two times waking up, seeing her heartbroken, and then being let out to just kill himself again. And then, one time where he just woke up and gave in. He could play the part they assigned him easily enough. He would pretend to be happy, to be a part of their perfect utopian society. To stop all of this. He did everything they asked, answered all of their questions how they wanted them, and went back to his job like they wanted when they let him out. And he ignored the ache in his chest when he played the cello and it just never sounded right.

                Then the ache would leave instantly when he would see her smile. He supposed that was reason enough to put up with the whole charade, because she made it so it was not one. She made the happiness real and his heart race. She made him want to live. So he did.

                Oh, did he live. He would dance around their apartment with her, spinning her and serenading her at all hours of the day, just to hear her giggle. He would dip her low and listen to that bright peal of laughter and feel his heart soar high above them. He lived to love her, and for a while that was so much more than enough. To just be in her presence at home, or to go on spontaneous late night adventures, was more than enough to make his charade _real_. To make him feel real for the first time in ages.

 

He had no blood relatives, it turned out. Just a collection of friends he called family. A scrawny blond with endless fight and energy in him. A couple insanely smart brunets, one who spoke a mile a minute and one who let the other do the talking for him. A large blond mountain of muscle and his brother, who was the exact opposite of him in both looks and personality. An archer. A couple soldiers. They flooded his apartment every moment they got. Whether he wanted them to or not.

                The small blond was the worst about that. It amused her. She loved showing up to the small man following him around with an ice pack to his face, grumbling under his breath about this and that. It amused him, too, in a way. The blond gave him another sort of purpose. Someone had to keep the other out of trouble. Between his classes, her, and his friends, he did not have enough time to feel sad.

                He wanted to be alive, for once.

 

She had wanted to go to the mountains for the weekend. A vacation, just the two of them, to celebrate him being home and happy. He had resisted the urge to frown at how much emphasis she put on happy, simply nodding and asking when they were leaving. The redhead was not wrong; he was happy with her and his life. Yet, he had thought he had escaped all of the focus on his happiness when he had finally left that hospital and moved her into his apartment.

                He pushed that aside just like everything else to focus on helping her pack. They had fun with it, tossing things at each other and teasing one another senselessly. He completely forgot her comment, losing himself in her. When they finally got on the road, he found himself just staring at her as she slept in the passenger seat.

                How had he gotten so lucky?

 

When he woke up in the hospital, the doctors said he was in an accident. He was lucky to be alive. He gave them all a confused look, not remembering why he had wound up here. He had been headed to the mountains with her. What had gone wrong? Was that all just a dream? He tried to move, to get up and get out of this hell hole, but found he had difficulty moving without his head throbbing. Severe head injury, they said. He would survive, and be out the next day, if not that afternoon.

                That was a relief. He pushed away his concern, asking about the redhead and when she would come to see him. No one had an answer for him.

 

He played the cello at her funeral. Finally, everything felt right. But it was not. God, was it not.


End file.
